Any PHP/cURL/vBulletin experts out there?

[Spiderman]

I'm trying to write a program that ties into the forum software to send a private message. The program will be called by an admin while they're logged in to the forum, so I have all the security & cookie info. Because it's a POST request, things are a little more complicated. I'm pretty sure I'm stuck trying to get the cookies set properly for the "new session". Documentation isn't the best, so I'm not even sure if I'm doing it right.

I've tried php with fsockopen... (I'm sending $_COOKIE as the parameter value for $cookies):

...
  $parts=parse_url($url);
 
  $fp = fsockopen($parts['host'], 
          isset($parts['port'])?$parts['port']:80, 
          $errno, $errstr, 30);
  if (!$fp) {
      return false;
  } else {
      $out = "POST ".$parts['path']." HTTP/1.1\r\n";
      $out.= "Host: ".$parts['host']."\r\n";
      $out.= "Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded\r\n";
      $out.= "Content-Length: ".strlen($parts['query'])."\r\n";
 
      foreach( $cookies as $name => $value )
      {
       if ($name == "cscvbsessionhash" 
       || $name == "cscvblastvisit" 
       || $name == "cscvblastactivity")
       { 
         $out .= 'Cookie: ' . $name . '=' . $value . "\r\n";
        }
      }
      $out.= "Connection: Close\r\n\r\n";
      if (isset($parts['query'])) $out.= $parts['query'];
 
      // for debugging
      echo "<p>";
      echo "out = " . $out;
      echo "<p>";
 
      fwrite($fp, $out);
 
      // for debugging
      while (!feof($fp)) {
        echo fgets($fp, 128);
      }
 
      fclose($fp);
      return true;
  }

and cURL:

...
$ch = curl_init('http://www.cosportbikeclub.org/forums/private.php');
curl_setopt ($ch, CURLOPT_POST, 1);
foreach( $_COOKIE as $name => $value )
{
 if ($name == "cscvbsessionhash" 
 || $name == "cscvblastvisit" 
 || $name == "cscvblastactivity")
 {
  // I even added domain & path, but to no avail
  curl_setopt ($ch, CURLOPT_COOKIE, $name . "=" . $value . "domain=.www.cosportbikeclub.org; path=/");
 }
}
 
curl_setopt
(
 $ch, CURLOPT_POSTFIELDS, 
  urlencode
  (
   "&do=insertpm"
   . <other parameters go here>
     )
);
curl_setopt ($ch, CURLOPT_FOLLOWLOCATION, 1);
curl_exec ($ch);
curl_close ($ch);

and even tho I was logged in to the forum when I clicked the link to call the page with the above code (both sets of code end with the same result), the (debugging) page I end up on indicates that I'm not logged in (User Name & Password box appear on top-right, along with Log In button), and there's an error message:

Sorry. The administrator has banned your IP address. To contact the administrator click here

I'm not really banned tho, or even entirely logged out - if I click on Today's Posts, the next page shows me as being logged in (Username, last visit date, & notifications take the place of the User Name & Password box & Log In button).

I've already wasted 2 days getting to this point, and another day trying to get past it. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

TIA

[mclarke]

Lemme look at it when I get home Bob. Please stand by...

[Spiderman]

Thanks Matt... FWIW, I found some help here, including what was supposed to be a solution to the problem I posted yesterday (see link in last comment/post near bottom of page), but that solution doesn't seem to be working.

[mclarke]

Now that is a funky error message... wow!

I am still trying to figure out what is wrong with your php script. I am curious why it is not reading the cookie... Let me open my local one and see if I can find this.

Excellent problem